


Tell Me

by NothingxRemains



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M, One Shot, The Avengers (2012) - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-27
Updated: 2019-03-27
Packaged: 2019-12-18 16:08:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18253256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NothingxRemains/pseuds/NothingxRemains
Summary: He hates that this revelation is tainted by the circumstances, while the scepter poisons his mind and his magic, standing on opposite sides of destiny. But he thinksdamn the Norns, he won't let them ruin this, ruin them before they've even had a chance together, hewon't.





	Tell Me

**Author's Note:**

> I saw the new posters that Marvel released for Endgame and I'm UPSET. They've given me the feels all over again. 
> 
> Anyway. 
> 
> This is a drabble I wrote a few months ago and never posted. Realized there probably wasn't gonna be more so I just polished it up a bit. Enjoy.

_"I've been seeing all, I've been seeing your soul_  
_Give me things that I wanted to know_  
_Tell me things that you've done_

  
_I've been feeling old, I've been feeling cold_  
_You're the heat that I know_  
_See, you are my sun."_

 

_Flume & Chet Faker - Drop The Game _

 

 

 

He remembers running through the sunlit corridors, breathless, adrenaline rushing through his veins as he fled from the palace guards, Thor at his side. Countless adventures saving each other from danger, treating it like a game, a violent blood filthy dance privy to just the two of them.

He remembers Thor outgrowing him, becoming bigger and brighter and all-encompassing. Becoming _more_.

He has always been missing something, when he was sought out and found lacking. Knew it in the way he'd run circles around people and created general mayhem, snickering and pleased, only for his mother to smile like she knew she shouldn't, for his father's disappointed countenance to fall upon him and silence him better than any reprimand. It's these things that give him moments of clarity, aware that he is completely out of sink with everything around him and wondering when that happened or if he has always been this way, his world slightly off kilter.

And then he falls, and it shatters, and then Thanos finds him in the ether and forces the pieces back together mangled and bloody and broken until Loki barely recognizes himself. He takes the gift offered to him, grins with bloodied teeth and bows with barely restrained mockery and quells his tongue when  the mad creature croons ‘little god.’ This, he thinks, is the most dangerous game he's ever played, but he's determined to win, even if his only reward is simply _surviving_.

He gets to Midgard and he feels like he's been stretched beyond his limits and then hastily reformed, hollowed out, nearly swaying on his feet, half mad with exhaustion and power and the frayed edges of his own mind.

Time goes by in a giddy haze. He's spurred on by the enticement of freedom but he's not there, not yet, the chitauri still claw at him in their master's name and the alluring whispers of the scepter leave him nearly manic most of the time. He flounces down the staircase with the taste of victory on his lips and gouges a man's eye out, forces the people of a nameless city to their knees, thrill in his veins because the game is _alive_ and he's _winning_.

And then a metal man comes flying from the sky.

He thinks it must have hit the other man first, for Loki's face is in plain view whereas all Loki sees is metal, registers the way his hands come up in threat and then stutter halfway.

The other mortal, a man in ridiculous blue armor with a bright star in the center of his chest that complements his shiny shield, shouts something and move towards him threateningly but the metal man throws and arm and says _wait_. Its quiet for a moment while the man looks at his metal companion incredulously.

Then he sees the faceplate open to reveal the mortal inside, and his mind goes quiet, _oh,_ world falling into alignment as if it has always been.

He hates that this revelation is tainted by the circumstances, while the scepter poisons his mind and his magic, standing on opposite sides of destiny. But he thinks _damn the Norns_ , he won't let them ruin this, ruin them before they've even had a chance together, he _won't._

“Come with me,” the man says quietly, eyes soft and beseeching.

 _I see you_ , they say.

“Okay,” he says.

 

* * *

 

He's quiet where he sits on the metal contraption. He can't think beyond that captivating presence, and yet he feels more clear headed than he ever did under the influence of the scepter. He resists the immediate temptation to drop it like it's burned him, merely sits and places it beside him on the bench. The man(‘Stark,’ he’s gathered from the man’s shield brothers) argues against restraints, and Loki would offer to let them if it would make them feel better even if he doubts they could actually restrain him.

Stark sits beside him, leans forward to brace his elbows on his knees and Loki becomes acutely aware of the suddenly meager distance between them. He hesitantly drags his eyes away from his hands on his knees to the person beside him. His breath catches when he realizes the man has left the protection of his metal suit, sees it standing open and empty a few feet away. He trails over tan hands and a compact frame, gets stuck on the bright star glowing in the man's chest for a moment before the need to see his face again drags them yet more upward until those deep brown eyes catch him once more. He feels like a fly caught in a trap, and a bit like he's drowning; because it's not wariness or disdain or apathy in those eyes, or even something soft and besotted like affection or pity. No, it's _curiosity,_ that deep rooted kind of fascination to take something apart and examine it piece by piece, learn every inch of it as well as though you'd made it yourself and then put back together even better than before, even if it wasn't necessarily broken. Loki is probably most definitely broken, but he thinks he wouldn't mind being coerced into his full potential under that unwavering focus.

He licks dry lips and his pulse flutters when the other tracks the motion, parts his lips as though to speak and closes them again when no sound is forthcoming. Stark's mouth twitches upwards at the corner.

“So, name’s Tony Stark. You got a name, Reindeer Games?”

He finds words at last. “Loki of…” he swallows. _Of Asgard._ But he finds he doesn't want Tony's impression of him to be overshadowed by the impression of everything that encompasses. _Laufeyson, of monsters. Odinson, of Asgard, the golden realm. “_ Loki,” he repeats.

He can see Tony latch onto his reluctance, sees it in his eyes as he decodes Loki's hesitation like it will reveal all his secrets, and he's irrationally worried that it will, as if that single moment was enough to give everything away.

“Loki,” he echoes, and Loki suppresses a shiver.

“What have you done to me?” He says softly, half to distract him from picking Loki apart and half because he can't bring himself to fight this strange calm that's touched him to his core, even though he wants to.

“Same thing you've done to me, I'm guessing.”

“I've done nothing. To you, at least.”

Tony's face does something like he's not sure whether to smirk or grimace.

“Yeah, we’re probably gonna have to talk about that sooner rather than later.”

Loki lowers his eyes, focuses on the bright light instead. He refuses to feel shame or guilt for the things he's done, for they are the price of the things he wants, pieces on a playing board, but he feels something like it.

“Ah. Yes, I. Well.” He clears his throat and takes a risk. “The cost of freedom is high,” he reveals quietly. He looks up in time to see understanding focus sharply, and Loki knows at once that he's grasped everything in that one little sentence. He's not sure how much that is exactly, but something inside him relaxes, because however much, it is still enough.

There's nothing but the sound of turbulence for the next few minutes, as those eyes search Loki's face over and over again, and it is the god's turn to he fascinated as he watches the man sink into himself before his eyes, turning the sentence over in his mind.

“Someone else is pulling the strings,” he says suddenly into the quiet, surprising Loki. “You've got enough power to travel who knows how far across the universe, and brainwash people, and you're probably some sort of god, and this whole mess is orchestrated by somebody big and bad enough to scramble your brains and make you dance to their tune, which may or may not be something like world domination.” Loki grows more and more shocked with every word, reeling even as Tony starts slewing profanity.

From one sentence this mortal had gleaned enough information to understand that, as powerful a creature as Loki is, someone was formidable enough to pluck him from the cosmos and force him to do everything he'd done for just a chance at escaping their grasp.

This mortal is unique, he decides, for beyond his vessel his mind is brilliant in a way he has seldom seen in all his adventures of the nine realms. His amazement at this sterling revelation is tempered by the topic at hand.

“Universal decimation,” he corrects delicately, not denying a word Tony has spoken in the same breath. His companions goggle at the indirect confirmation, looking decidedly more stressed than they did ten seconds ago.

It is a grim future that awaits all of them, he's sure, but this unexpected turn of his events have left him with potential allies. He looks into his soulmate's eyes as they steel with determination and thinks that maybe, just maybe, they might survive.


End file.
